present the findings of the first national study of voluntary work and active citizenship amongst prisoners. They argue that, despite pockets of good practice, the Prison Service has largely failed to take advantage of the resettlement potential offered by such activities.

In the past decade the probation service has experienced significant change. A new ‘knowledge’ has emerged, known as ‘what works’, which aims to use the ‘best available evidence-base’ for planning and implementing effective interventions with offenders. Simultaneously, there has been an embracing of ‘punishment’, as opposed to ‘welfarism’, as the appropriate milieu of the probation service. When deconstructed these two features share some common elements, within which a hegemonic masculinist approach to crime control and offender management can be discerned.

Storytelling is central to human understanding and knowledge. Through listening, reflecting, and retelling a story, new discoveries can be made and an unconcealment, of something that would otherwise remain hidden, occurs. This article uses my experience of undertaking life story research with male ex-prisoners to explore a number of issues raised by Jewkes in her article on doing prison research differently. I suggest that concerns about research "contamination" impact how we do research and how we respond to the emotional experience of doing ethnographic research in criminology. The first potentially restricts modes of analysis, such as intertextual readings of interviews, while the second may prevent a more humanistic relationship between researcher and participant developing. Contamination, rather than something that we connect with polluting, spoiling, or dirtying, should be embraced as offering the potential for revealing new knowledge and ways of doing research differently.

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This is a reflective piece that explores how work to support children and families of prisoners in the North East of England developed from very limited provision 10 years ago to what is now a substantial and multifaceted programme. The success of the work has been driven by the voluntary sector, with one key agency in particular taking a lead, supported by research that has provided the evidence base to demonstrate effectiveness, impact and areas for improvement. We see the persistence and commitment of a key voluntary sector agency, backed up by strategy and a supportive prison environment, has created strong children and families provision in the North East.